Stunt Bike Riders Are Making Motorcycles Fly

Once populated by outlaws who ran from the cops and sold videos of their incredible motorcycle tricks, sport bike stunt riding is now on the verge of becoming the next big extreme sport. Say hello to the riders of the XDL Championship Series.

Stunt Bike Riders Are Making Motorcycles Fly

Stunt Bike Riders Are Making Motorcycles Fly

During a practice run before the XDL Championship Series in Indianapolis, pro rider Aaron Colton pulls a 270 stoppie, which involves spinning the bike 180 degrees on the front tire and then completing the last 90 degrees in the air.

While riding a wheelie at 30 mph, Aaron Colton guns the gas. His motorcycle leaps off its back tire and into the air, a 400-pound blur of black metal and orange plastic. Both tires slam to the ground, and with the bike still moving forward, Colton taps the front brake, snapping the bike's rear tire in the air while he keeps the bike balanced and rolling fast on the front tire—too fast. He's almost out of pavement. Colton quickly drops the back end and clamps down hard on both brakes. The bike shimmies sideways, sliding to a stop right before crashing into a barrier.

And that, my friends, is a wheelie-bunny-hop-into-stoppie, one of the most dangerous trick combinations in sportbike stunt riding. Only a handful of riders in the world can land it. "I ran a little too fast and hard," Colton says afterward, sweat streaming down his cheeks. "Even to me, what we're doing out here is pretty mind-blowing."

XDL veteran Chris "Teach" McNeil, a Latin teacher at a middle school in Maine, practices a stoppie (foreground) while fellow stunter Aaron Colton sits on his gas tank and does a Special K wheelie. The stoppie, itself a dangerous stunt, is the launching point for a host of new aerial tricks. Coasting on their front wheel, riders squeeze the front brake, which compresses the fork, effectively turning it into a loaded spring. With enough speed and force, bikes can leap up to 2 feet in the air.

Colton is competing in the XDL Championship Series, a two-day event on a closed-off street in downtown Indianapolis. Indy is the last of five XDL competitions held each season. Hundreds of fans have paid $20 to $35 to bake in the summer heat and watch a dozen of the world's best stunt riders. They've come to witness such tricks as the highchair wheelie, in which competitors leap onto the motorcycle's front fairing or handlebars while simultaneously twisting the throttle to pop the front wheel into the air, and the switchback elevator, where riders jump from a seated position to stand on the tank—while spinning 180 degrees to face backward.

Colton, of Shakopee, Minn., is considered one of the ­burgeoning sport's stars. At 20, he has already won an XDL Championship Series and has his own action-figure doll and branded line of motorcycle merchandise. "X Games is ­mainstream, and stunt riding can become that," he says.